A Long Way From Home
by Sierra-Falls
Summary: Oneshot. Somewhat altaverse. While the matriarch Khu Lon was away helping Xian Pu pursue her husband, something was happening back at their village. Something involving another pigtailed male named Ranma.


A.N. This is a one-shot. I don't know where the idea came from, but it sounded kinda funny. If anyone wants this idea, I'd pretty much welcome someone making it into a real story, but please, email me and let me know. Not only do I want a little prior info with what you're going to do, I too, would like to see what it turns out like. I can be found at Sierra_Falls@hotmail.com  
  
Thoughts for Ranma plot devices:  
  
Ranma has lived for a thousand years or more, and during that time, he has been a very busy little boy. When he first arrived, he was knocked unconscious by the purity of the air. His body was far more refined to separating out the harmful portions of stuff that normally lingered in the air that this abrupt change was a shock to his system. During that time of unconsciousness, though, something awful had happened. He was robbed. A very useful item of his had been taken along with his provisions and shirt. Damn it, they didn't even leave him his shirt!  
  
Somehow, that item moved over a long period of time into Amazon hands and due to its misused properties, was considered a tool of punishment for those who break their sacred laws.  
  
Now in the present, when Ranma ran into the modern Amazons, he had somehow broken one of their laws. All he wanted to do was find something he had placed there when he first arrived. Each of the feminine warriors was ganging up on him. It wasn't his fault that to their senses, he was a very powerful warrior. When Ranma is 'brought to bay' so to speak, the elder and temporary matriarch comes up with a sufficient punishment. Ling Ling, go get Mister Po Po. The crowd inhaled with shock. Mister Po Po was the punishment artifact of the tribe, and it sentences those guilty to a fate worse than death. When Ling Ling came back with the small oblong box carried gingerly in her hands, the elder snatches it up and quickly forces it into Ranma's hands. Just as the elder is about to speak the key term to activate it, Ranma bursts out laughing.  
  
"So that's where it got to! Thanks elder, I've been looking for this."  
  
At the elder's angry and confused look, Ranma readjusts his hand's position on the artifact, flips a hidden switch, and sends a surge of coded ki into the opened conduit. The item glows briefly, grows an antennae and transforms subtly, then activates another item that has been hidden for a long time.  
  
Somewhere over in Jusenkyo, buried under the mud at the bottom of the spring of drowned girl, multifaceted points of light blinked into existence as the central core of the machine started to hum with renewed life. A form beneath its mantle of muck started to shift and shake off its encumbrance. Finally clear of the grounds grasping grip, it shot out of the pool and the place of its purgatory to home in on its master's signal.  
  
Meanwhile, Ranma was still surrounded by the amazons, and the elder was just about to blow a gasket. This mere male, well actually half male now that he's broken one of their sacred laws of not going into the pools of sorrow, had tried her patience for the last time. "Explain, now, why you trespassed that sacred place."  
  
"I was looking for something I'd placed there long ago."  
  
"Lies, boy. The pools of sorrow have been there for over a thousand years, and you have never been seen in its vicinity before. Tell the truth."  
  
"A thousand years or more? Bah. What utter rubbish. When I placed the CT at the bottom of one of the springs, there was no pools of sorrow. Such a phenomena must have occurred after I'd been there. The only reason why I had to dive into the pool in the first place was because I'd lost the remote activator."  
  
At this, the male hefted the Amazon's tool of punishment.  
  
"You can imagine my surprise when after I'd immersed myself in the spring, I sensed a change come over my own form without my consent. You must realize that it is very hard to take me by surprise like that."  
  
"B-but, that's the tool of punishment, handed down from the very gods themselves less than a thousand years ago. How is it that you can make it glow like that, and transform?"  
  
"Handed down by the gods? Bwaha ha ha ha! Like I said, this is the CT remote. I made this a while back. Why shouldn't I know all of its tricks? Let me guess, you guys" when all the amazons tensed up and grew scowls on their faces at this, Ranma coughed and changed his wording. "I mean, women, just made those guilty of your idiotic laws hold this little doohickey and someone say "activate" right?" All of the amazons winced, as they expected the tool of punishment to carry through with its known threat. Of course they were surprised when nothing happened. "Then the one holding the remote would get fried, his brain scrambled for a good year, and start to emit a bad odor since his genes had been recoded for "most offensive on the planet"."  
  
At the elder's nod, Ranma just nodded to himself.  
  
"Hmm, since none of this actually kills the holder, you must use this as a punishment for those to be banished. No one would want a genetically restructured smelly person living with them in their village."  
  
A further nod to confirm his speculation.  
  
"Well, to put your minds at ease, that reaction was just a failsafe device I built into the remote so no one would get their hands on my CT. As I'm the original owner, I think I'll take it off of your hands. Sides, otherwise, I'd have to go operate the CT manually until I could build another."  
  
At this, the elder looked outraged.  
  
"Boy! You may know more secrets about this - remote thingie, but you can't just steal from us amazons. We won't let you."  
  
In her inner thoughts though, the next elder under Khu Lon was thinking 'Not unless you either agree to marry into the tribe, or agree to make more weapons of a similar caliber. I remember you saying that you made that device, and it is very effective.'  
  
"Puah! That is the most hilarious thing I've heard all day. 'Won't let me?' My dear woman, what makes you think you can stop me?"  
  
By this time, the much talked about and enigmatic machine known as the CT had made its way to its master. Floating in the air just about at head length, was what looked like a perfect model of a weird ship. With smooth lines and flared wings to either side, it looked like a more technologically advanced version of a missile. The only thing that halted that line of thought was that it was just hanging there, not speeding about on a destructive mission.  
  
The elder laughed herself.  
  
"THAT is a CT? It looks like one of those toy planes that can be bought at the American's store 'Radio Shack'"  
  
At this, Ranma got all huffy.  
  
"I'll have you know, you old bag, that this is one of the most advanced pieces of work I've done in a long time. It took me two decades to complete the inner hull, let alone all the modifications I've made."  
  
"So what's it do? Fly around and carry messages for good little boys and girls?"  
  
"No, you hag, it's a Carniean Transport vessel, also known as the CT, and it can transport up to a battle cruiser's worth in weight. It acts as my interplanetary vessel when I want to vacation."  
  
Everybody, I mean everybody burst out laughing at this ludicrous claim. It was beyond comprehension, beyond credibility. Who had ever heard of interplanetary travel, let alone think that tiny little fly could carry around a box, let alone a human or a battle cruiser.  
  
"Fine, don't believe me. I've already completed my mission with seeding this backwater planet with enough technological advances to ensure an imminent admission to the galactic council. I just want to go home and see my friends."  
  
As the raven pig-tailed male was fiddling with some minute switches on the remote, he muttered one last phrase to those rolling around on the floor laughing their asses off.  
  
"See if I care." the darkly frowning form said, before it collapsed into sparkling motes and being drawn up into the hovering Carniean Transport. The little missile ship gave a derogatory 'putt' sound before vanishing up into the atmosphere. Many jaws snapped shut with a click that would have broken less stronger teeth.  
  
The elder turned to her fellow Amazons.  
  
Their eyes all met and mutually agreed to something.  
  
Khu Lon would never believe this.  
  
The elder blinked once, slowly before issuing her proclamation.  
  
"The tool of punishment was lost when it exploded during the last banishment ceremony. Its pieces then disintegrated into nothing, and that is all we ever saw of it.  
  
It goes to say then, that Khu Lon would never learn of this. 


End file.
